198 JOHN DUNCAN, WEAVER AND BOTANIST. 



of the newspaper club of the place ; and a genial com- 

 panion " a fine body," as John said, or, as Charles Hunter 

 antithetically put it, " a terrible nice man." Though his 

 own education had been more limited than that of the 

 general run of teachers for he was originally a labourer 

 he was very successful in the elementary stages, and his 

 little school was crowded with pupils. The schoolmaster 

 was nothing of a botanist, but he was somewhat of a florist, 

 and prided himself on the neat garden that adorned his 

 thatched cottage, where Duncan used to work a great deal. 

 As John said, " Forbes never gaithered plants wi' me, but I 

 hae ta'en mony ane to him, and tell't him their names." 

 Being a bachelor of the sunny sort, nothing delighted the 

 dominie more than to gather round him, in his snug parlour, 

 a few congenial souls, whose intelligence and brightness 

 illumined " the tenebrific scene." 



Here of an evening might be seen assembled John 

 Duncan, Charles Black, Charles Hunter, and a few others 

 still mentioned with respect and affection by their survivors. 

 Here the newspapers were read, burning church questions 

 discussed (and Black and Forbes stuck to the Establish- 

 ment, while Duncan and Hunter went over to the dissen- 

 tients), and happy evenings passed in the flow of soul. 

 Charles Black's irrepressible spirit of fun burst out in such 

 genial society, and many were the practical jokes played on 

 each other, and not least on the good weaver. 



According to his custom, when the room was finer than 

 his stout boots were in his opinion worthy of, John took 

 them off on entering, not to dirty the floor, especially after he 

 had been out plant-hunting in the ditches. These some 

 one would hide, unknown to their owner. Then came the 



